A Big Table

This week I made communion visits. I filled my communion kit with wafers and wine and set out to bring the meal to those who could not be with us on Sunday.

I visited the woman in her 90s who could do stand up comedy about the trials of growing older (and, yes, she was trying to be funny). When it was time for communion, we also set a place for her daughter (whose profession has something to do with releasing emotional energy through tapping one's head and invited me to a workshop with a woman who sees angels and a man who sees ghosts -- I politely declined). We also set a place for the Lithuanian caregiver. Usually we would have invited the neighbor across the hall, but she was out of town. I visited another woman, also in her 90s, who was dressed in pearls and a striking suit and was delighted (and delightful) all five times that we had the same conversation. We were joined at the meal by her Filipino caregiver, who had come to find me when I couldn't find the aparment. Then it was on to the woman who, it seems, had forgotten she had moved. I stood for a long while at the front door of her empty house, as she told me through the cell phone that I ws in the right place, until at last her Ukrainian caregiver managed enough English to tell me the new address. When I finally arrived, the three of us shared the meal. The caregiver sat for a long while with her eyes closed and then tried to explain that she grew up in "Soviet times...you know...no God." Then to the woman in her bathrobe, whose caregiver went to her knees when she saw me hold up the wafer.

We spoke different languages. We came from different circumstances. By the next day some of us would not remember the little sip of wine we'd taken. In houses and condos and apartments we set up our meal in a small space -- a TV tray covered with a doily, the edge of the end table, the foot rest. But as we shared the bread and wine together I was amazed at how enormous this table really is.